By: Jennifer Newman, MFA '11

Ruby Lerner’s leadership of Creative Capital has been characterized by her belief that a small amount of money at the right moment can be transformative for an artist’s career. “If that catalytic moment is missed,” she explains, “it doesn’t matter how much money is given, the artist cannot catch up.” According to Lerner, “The project is really the window into the artist’s practice and our goal is really to shadow the creative trajectory, to be there at critical moments in the project’s life and stay out of the artist’s way the rest of the time.” This philosophy has led to an engaged and intimate relationship between the Creative Capital staff and the grantees. By knowing what is going on with the artists through every stage of their process, Creative Capital can respond quickly and tactically. As Lerner frames it, “In this noisy, competitive, environment we need to surround the artist with a lot of resources; different people with different skill sets, different money for different purposes at different points in the project’s life. It really takes a lot for something to succeed, especially in this current climate, so we want to be able to get people the resources that they need.”

This paper provides a detailed history and background of a premier “venture philanthropy” organization.

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